Sewing machine attachment for making infant&#39;s garment



April 24, 1956 N. cs. GODSHALL 2,742,870

SEWING MACHINE ATTACHMENT FOR MAKING INFANTS GARMENT Filed Dec. 21. 1953 INVENTOR. MCI/01M 6. Gaps/mu.

T ORNEY April 1956 N. G. GODSHALL 2,742,870

SEWING MACHINE ATTACHMENT FOR MAKING INFANTS GARMENT Filed Dec. 21, 1953 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 INVENTOR. 1V 10/0144: 67 GODJWALL TORNE'Y United States Patent Ofiice 2,742,870 Patented Apr. 24, 1956 2,742,870 SEWING MACHINE ATTACHMENT FOR MAKING INFANTS GARMENT Nicholas G. Godsball, Ephrata, Pa., assignor to Walter W. Moyer Company, Inc., Ephrata, Pa., a corporation of Pennsylvania Original application December 6, 1951, Serial No. 260,164, now Patent No. 2,669,722, dated February 23, 1954. Divided and this application December 21, 1953, Serial No. 399,479

1 Claim. (Cl. 112-114) The present invention relates to an infants shirt-type garment of the type having tapes sewed to the interior thereof onto which diapers may be pinned and to the method of tacking said tapes to the interior of the shirt, and, more particularly, to the necessary sewing machine attachments for carrying out the method. The present application is a division of my copending application Serial No. 260,164 filed December 6, 1951, on Infants Garment and Method of Making Same, now Patent No. 2,669,722.

It is well known in the art to provide an infants shirttype garment formed of knit material and'havingfabric oops or strips sewed to opposite sides of the center line of the front panel on the interior of the garment so as to constitute supporting means for attaching a diaper by safety pins. Such type of garment is shown in United States Patent 2,551,809 issued to Harry R. Ryan. An outstanding disadvantage of this construction of garment, such as shown in said Ryan patent, is that the ends of the loops or strips are generally cut in the form of a semicircle in order to correspond to the shape of a circular stitching used for attaching the strips or tabs to the interior of the garment. By such cutting of the strip ends in the form of a semicircle, there is a substantial waste of material from which the strips are cut. Additionally, I have found that contrary to the teachings of this patent, substantial improvement is obtained by at- I taching the strips to the garment by means of stitching extending along rectilinear paths instead of a nonrectilinear or circular path. Another outstanding disadvantage of the above Well-known type of construction, such as shown in the patent, is that the conventional way of attaching the strips or tabs is by turning the shirt inside out and then sewing the tabs to the interior surface of the front panel of the garment, and thereafterturning the shirt rightside out again. These turnings add substantially to the time required for constructing the garment, and thus increases manufacturing costs. Additionally, the above method results in stitching on, the outside of the garment which is in the form of under stitching often referred to as wrong side stitching, since it has loose threads which must be trimmed and which stitching is not neat in appearance as the top stitching or so-called; right sidev stitching which would occur, in this case, on the inner. surface of the garment where it normally cannot be seen. Furthermore, in carrying out the conventional method of attaching tabs, as shown in the patent, whereby the garment is turned inside out, set in a sewing machine, and thetape or tab is placed on top thereof, and thereafter clamped by the conventional garment holding clamp, there is often a tendency for the garment to slip during placement of the tape, thereby resulting in improper positioning of the tape.

An object of the present invention is to provide an infants shirt-type garment wherein the interiorly stitched diaper-supporting tapes or strips are sewed in a manner that the right side stitching appears on the outside instead of the inside so as to considerably enhance the appearance of the garment when worn.

A further object of the invention is to provide a substantially triangular tacking for attaching the tapes to the interior of an infants shirt-type garment which greatly increases resistance against stresses when the tapes are pulled and eliminates concentration of stresses on any one or more loops or strand sections of the knit fabric yarn.

A still further object of the present invention is to provide a novel attachment means for a flat bed type of sewing machine for enabling the sewing of tabs or tapes on the interior of infant garments without the necessity of turning the garment inside out or vice versa and which enables the right side stitching to be on the outside of the garment instead of the inside, thereby considerably improving the appearance of the outside stitching.

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from a study of the following description taken with the accompanying drawings wherein:

Fig. 1 is a front view of an infants shirt-type garment embodying the present invention;

Fig. 2 is an enlarged cross-sectional view taken along line II.II of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a perspective view of a flat bed or long arm type of sewing machine including an attachment embodying the principles of the present invention for enabling the sewing of tapes along a triangular path and in the manner embodying the principles of the present invention;

Fig. 4 is an enlarged fragmentary side View of the arch clamp and associated parts shown in Fig. 3 and which are adapted to move in a horizontal plane along a triangular path with respect to the needle, and

Fig. 5 is an enlarged fragmentary top view of the feed plate and the respective clamps held thereagainst, all of which move in a horizontal plane along a triangular path during the stitching operation.

Referring more particularly to Figs. 1 and 2, numeral 1 denotes an infants shirt-type garment formed of knit material, such as a tubular knit fabric of cotton, wool, rayon or mixtures thereof. The garment is of conventional design and has sewed to the inside surface thereof strips or tapes 2 of woven fabric which are conventionally used for supporting diapers by attaching safety pins to the strips rather than to the shirt itself. Strips 2 are pref.- erably made in the form of straight rectangular pieces of tape Whose ends are cut along transverse straight lines so as to conserve strip material as compared to cutting strips with semicircular ends.

In accordance with the present invention, substantially increased strength of the stitching is provided by employing stitching 3 which extends along a triangular path, that is, along several rectilinear paths instead of along the conventional circular path. This enables the matching of the base of the triangle of the stitching with the end of the tape since both extend along straight transverse lines, and more important such triangular stitching eliminates the tendency of concentration of stresses along any one loop or strand section as often occurs when circular stitching is used.

An outstanding feature of the present invention resides in the method of fasteningv or so-called triangular tacking of the tapes of the interior'of the garment in a manner so as to eliminate the necessity of turning the garment inside out and then, right side out, which is necessary according to the conventional method of stitching the tapes. The present invention relates to a method whereby the tapes may be attached or tacked to the inside of the garment without the necessity of turning the garment inside out and vice versa, therefore not only saving the operations of turning, but improving the appearance of the garment, inasmuch as the present method enables the right side stitching to be on the outside rather than on the inside as occurs in conventional construction of infants garments.

Fig. 3 shows a flat bed type of sewing machine such as, for example, 21 Singer class 69 machine, with the conventional arch clamp 5 which is fastened to a feed plate 6. As is well known in the art, the gearing of such machine is so arranged as to enable movement of the arch clamp 5 and feed plate 6 along a predetermined path, such as the conventional circular path, while the needle is reciprocating vertically along a fixed path. Thus, when the garment holding presser clamp 7 (which is vertically movable such as by means of the conventional treadle control, not shown) is lowered onto the garment so as to clamp it against feed plate 6, the presser clamp 7 together with feed plate 6 and arch clamp 5 all move along a circular path in a horizontal plane to provide circular stitching. In such conventional construction, clamp 7 has a circular hole instead of a triangular hole as shown.

In accordance with the present invention, the garment holding presser clamp 7 is provided with a triangular cutout instead of a circular cutout, and, of course, the machine must be constructed so that the feed plate 6 will move along a triangular path together with arch clarnp 5 and a presser clamp 7. Presser clamp 7 is connected by means of supports 8 to the arch clamp 5 so that it will move together with the feed plate 6 in a horizontal plane along a triangular path while the sewing machine is reciprocating along a fixed vertical path through the garment and tape which are clapped in place in the manner to be described.

According to the present invention, an additional attachment is provided in the form of a spring steel clamp 10 having ends 10a and 10b which are fastened to the arch clamp 5 by any suitable fastening means, such as bolts, screws, etc., and which clamp 10 at the other end thereof is provided with a V-shaped cutout terminating in end portions 100 which are preferably bent upwardly at the edges thereof to facilitate introduction of the tape or strip, such as 2, between the V-shaped legs of clamp 10 and the feed plate 6.

In operation, the tape, cut out in the shape of tape 2, is slipped underneath the spring clamp 10, immediately under the end thereof with the triangular cutout and terminating in end portions 100. The clamp 10 is of spring steel or similar metal so as to afford a resilient clamping action on the tape sandwiched between it and feed plate 6. The lower portion of the garment is then slipped above spring clamp 10 and because of the elongated shape of clamp 10, enough of the garment is slipped over the length thereof until the part which is marked for matching with a corresponding marked portion of the tape, will come into registry with the latter in a given position within the triangular area defined by presser clamp 7. Thereafter, the presser clamp 7 is lowered such as by a treadle or other conventional control (not shown) so that it will clamp the garment (with its outside surface facing upwardly) onto the top of the V-shaped portion of the tape holding clamp 10. Then the machine is operated so as to enable the feed plate 6, garment holding pressing clamp 7 and tape holding clamp 10 to move in unison in a horizontal plane along a triangular path while the needle is reciprocated along a fixed vertical path, thus resulting in stitching or tacking of the tape along a triangular path such as defined by the triangular cutout in the presser clamp 7. Upon completion of the triangular tacking, presser clamp 7 is raised and the gar- 4 ment is pulled out of its clamping engagement between clamp 10 and feed plate 6. Thus the right side stitching will be on the outside of the garment, instead of on the inside as in conventional constructions, and there is eliminated any necessity of turning the garment inside out or vice versa, for the tape-stitching operation.

Thus it will be seen that I have provided an improved infants garment of the type having diaper supporting tapes tacked to the inside thereof, wherein the right side stitching appears on the outside of the garment so as to enhance its appearance, and wherein a triangular tacking is used instead of the conventional nonrectilinear or circular tacking, thereby considerably increasing the resistance to stresses in any one loop or strand section, and which allows the ends of the tapes to be cut along straight edges so as to conserve material as compared to cutting them along semi-circular paths resulting in waste of strip material; furthermore, I have provided a novel attachment for a fiat bed and long arm type of sewing machine, particularly in the addition of a tape holding, spring clamp for making it possible to tack said tapes on the manner indicated without the necessity of turning the garment inside out and vice versa for the tacking operation, thereby reducing time normally required for the stitching or tacking operation as well as manufacturing costs.

While I have illustrated and described a certain specific embodiment of my invention, it will be understood that this is by way of illustration, and that various changes and modifications may be made within the contemplation of my invention and within the scope of the following claim.

I claim:

In a flat bed or long arm sewing machine of the type comprising a feed plate, an arch clamp rigidly secured thereon, and a vertically movable presser clamp for clamping a garment between it and the feed plate and in which said arch and presser clamps are driven in a horizontal plane along a closed triangular path while the needle is reciprocating along a fixed vertical path, in combination, a spring clamp formed of an elongated flat strip of spring metal having one end attached substantially at the rear of said arch clamp a substantial distance from said presser clamp, and the other end being sandwiched between said feed plate and presser clamp, there being considerable space above said spring clamp between it and said arch clamp, said other end being V-shaped with upturned ends and yieldably pressed against said feed plate normally by the resiliency of said elongated fiat strip so as to tightly sandwich therebetween a tape to be sewn onto the garment, while said garment is clamped between the presser clamp and spring clamp, said presser clamp having a triangular cut-out substantially in registry with said V-shaped end but with said upturned ends extending beyond two end portions of the presser clamp, whereby said feed plate, presser clamp and spring clamp may be moved along a triangular path during reciprocation of said needle and whereby long sections of said garment may be slipped over said spring clamp when said tape is to be stitched thereto.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 

